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Amex, best known for high-end cards such as its Platinum and Black, is continuing an expansion in thee opposition end of the wealth spectrum to provide banking products without physical branches at prices that appeal to people who don’t want to pay bank fees.

The company today announced its full service reloadable prepaid account, Serve, will be available for purchase at 4,100 Walmart stores nationwide. These Walmart stores will also become a part of Serve’s free cash reloading network. This means Serve customers can now add cash to their Account for free across 19,500 U.S. Walmart, CVS/pharmacy, and participating 7-ELEVEN locations. Amex in 2012 teamed up with Walmart to offer a Bluebird card which generated more than one million accounts in its first year.

“By offering American Serve alongside Bluebird at Walmart, we’re expanding our portfolio of products to meet the needs of more Walmart shoppers,” said Dan Schulman, group president of enterprise growth at American Express. “Bluebird is a great option for the ‘unhappily banked’ who are looking for a true alternative to the fees and hidden charges often associated with debit and checking. With Serve, our full service reloadable prepaid account, we can now provide the nearly 70 million Americans who are unbanked or underbanked a simple and affordable way to move and manage their money.”

American Express Serve will now be available along with Bluebird by American Express in Walmart stores. Serve, the company’s full service reloadable prepaid account, will be sold for a purchase price of $1.95 in Walmart, in the prepaid section of checkout lanes and Walmart MoneyCenters. Bluebird by American Express will continue to be available for customers seeking an alternative to a checking or debit account.

For a low $1 monthly fee, American Express Serve offers customers the ability to direct deposit their paycheck for free, pay bills online for free, add checks to their account using mobile check capture, and get free ATM withdrawals at over 24,000 ATMs nationwide. The $1 monthly fee is waived if customers use Direct Deposit to add money to their account or add $500 or more to their account during a monthly statement period.

At Money2020 in Las Vegas last year, Schulman said that Bluebird customers can include households earning $50,000 to $150,000. He noted that many people in the U.S. are poorly served. With more than 1,800 branches closed in the last few years, many people don’t have a bank close by.

“Our financial systems are failing to meet the needs of a large portion of people around the world,’” Schulman said. “There are more than 2 billion people in the world, and 70 million in the US, that are poorly served by the traditional financial system.”

He said customers were using Bluebird to run their financial lives, depositing to their accounts through mobile phones and paying bills from the accounts.

Amex now brings inexpensive or free banking services to a large part of the U.S.

“Our evaluation of the top nine leading prepaid debit programs showed that American Express Serve now has the largest free cash reload network across 19,500 store locations compared to competitors. American Express Serve is making it even more convenient for consumers to add cash to their accounts so they can use those funds to quickly and easily manage their personal finances,” said Madeline Aufseeser, senior analyst, Aite Group.

In addition to helping people who have struggled with bank fees and spending hours in lines to pay bills, Schulman said at the Las Vegas conference that this could mark fundamental change in finance.

“The penetration of mobile phones truly has the potential to disrupt the prevailing wisdom that it has to be expensive to be poor,” he said. “I think we are entering the era of the nonbank -- consumers have all the power of a bank branch in the palm of their hand. Technology will redefine the world of consumer retail banking.”

In addition to helping people who have struggled with bank fees and spending hours in lines to pay bills, Schulman thinks this could mark fundamental change in finance.

“The penetration of mobile phones truly has the potential to disrupt the prevailing wisdom that it has to be expensive to be poor,” he said. “I think we are entering the era of the nonbank -- consumers have all the power of a bank branch in the palm of their hand. Technology will redefine the world of consumer retail banking.”